Tag Archives: science

By DAVID TORTORANO Sometime next year at a site in south Mississippi, four RS-25 engines and the core stage of NASA’s Space Launch System will roar to life in a teeth-rattling spectacle during a static test at the historic B-2 test stand. With a combined 2 million pounds of thrust, the engine core test at Stennis Space Center (SSC) will ...

John C. Stennis Space Center, north of Interstate 10 in South Mississippi, is a 14,000-acre secure complex surrounded by a unique 125,000-acre heavily wooded buffer zone. It’s where some of the most powerful rocket engines in the world have been tested, including 27 first- and second-stage boosters for the Saturn V. In 2008 the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics ...

NASA has selected 399 research and technology proposals from 277 American small businesses and 44 research institutions that will enable NASA’s future missions into deep space, and advancements in aviation and science, while also benefiting the U.S. economy. The awards have a total value of approximately $49.9 million. These include 13 projects tied to Stennis Space Center. The agency received 1,621 proposals in response ...

Jackson State University will pay $1.17 million to settle claims that it didn’t keep records supporting spending of federal money, and then faked records it gave to auditors. The federal prosecutor in Jackson announced the agreement Wednesday about National Science Foundation grants the university received from 2006 to 2011. U.S. Attorney Gregory Davis says JSU agreed to repay the money ...

The Mississippi Department of Transportation has launched a new website to bolster STEM education in state schools. The science, technology, engineering and math website is designed to get more students interested in transportation industry careers, particularly civil engineering. MDOT said the website is part of its ongoing push to provide more educational opportunities to Mississippi’s students so they can better ...

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. — Astronaut Scott Kelly returned to Earth on Wednesday after an unprecedented year in space for NASA, landing in barren Kazakhstan with a Russian cosmonaut who shared his whole space station journey. Their Soyuz capsule parachuted onto the central Asian steppes and ended a science-rich mission at the International Space Station that began last March and was ...

JACKSON — A bill that would let physicians exempt children from Mississippi’s vaccination requirements is advancing in the state House. A split Education Committee voted Tuesday to push House Bill 938 (http://bit.ly/1S02JWj) to the full chamber for more debate. Rep. Mark Formby, a Picayune Republican, says the state should honor physicians’ wishes. Under current law, the state Health Department must ...

JACKSON — A small earthquake shook Madison County, Mississippi, on Monday, the U.S. Geological Survey said. It was the third quake in the area in the past two months. The 3.2-magnitude quake occurred at 8:23 a.m. Monday, said Paul Caruso, a geophysicist at the National Earthquake Information Center. The epicenter was about 4 miles southwest of Canton and 19 miles north-northeast ...

OCEAN SPRINGS — The Gulf of Mexico Research Initiative (GoMRI) has selected 12 research consortia to conduct scientific studies of the impacts of oil, dispersed oil, and dispersant on the Gulf of Mexico ecosystem and public health. These research investments focus on improving our fundamental understanding of the implications of events such as the Macondo well blowout, and on developing ...

WASHINGTON — Global warming is likely playing a bigger role than previously thought in dead zones in oceans, lakes and rivers around the world and it’s only going to get worse, according to a new study. Dead zones occur when fertilizer runoff clogs waterways with nutrients, such as nitrogen and phosphorous. That leads to an explosion of microbes that consumes ...